Woolen Mills School

1701 Woolen Mills Road
May 17, 1887, Charles Fansler purchased lots ten and eleven from A.R. Blakey and S.V. Southall, trustees handling sales of Julia Farish's property, the Farm. In 1900, when Fansler sold a portion of the land to H.A.Maddex the house pictured above had been erected. Maddex, in turn, sold the property to the Charlottesville Woolen Mill which put the building to use as the Woolen Mills School (Albemarle County provided the teacher, the mill provided the building).


The success of the growing Charlottesville mill can best be understood in the light of business conditions in general and the woolen manufacture in particular during the Reconstruction period. The vigor of the American economy continued for a time after the war, only to be checked in 1869 by a recession. Profits fell, credit tightened, and contraction set in, "except perhaps In the South, which was producing more and spending relatively less than before the war." In the early seventies another era of over-expansion, particularly in railroad construction, produced a major panic in 1873. A lengthy period of stagnation followed.
--Harry Poindexter